Tag Archives: #nomeatathlete

~ Day 19 ~~ Thursday, January 1st, 2015 ~
Push Through the DipNothing great is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer you that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen.– Epictetus

Cheyenne-
Completed my anchor habit for about 20 minutes with Remy. Led a great sitting meditation, then warm-up, then sitting poses from Om Yoga. Felt great to do it together… But then afterwards Remy told me honestly that he doesn’t like it when I ask him to do yoga the night before – it makes him feel obligated and cranky about it in the morning. He shared that he’d prefer if I simply told him in the morning, “I’m going to do my practice and you’re welcome to join me if you like.” I guess I can understand not wanting to do yoga out of requirement. I would always prefer to do yoga when I feel it’s my choice rather than something I have to do. I want him to feel good about yoga so I’m going to try to take this approach moving forward.

We can all learn something from my interaction with my partner this morning. We can make people feel negative thoughts or positive thoughts simply by demanding or leaving the opportunity open. Small differences in tone, demeanor, and word choice can make all the difference. When do you guilt someone you love into something because you don’t think they will do it unless they feel obliged to you?

Today’s action:

Do what it takes to keep your motivation strong. You’re over halfway through this program, but there are still a lot of actions to complete and changes to make. Catch up, get organized, review what you’ve done so far, and give yourself a dose of inspiration or an external reward.

Today I reviewed my notes and journals, and updated my business journal. I feel good about my progress, and I hope to do my weekly review this Sunday! I also took a nice shower and prepared for tomorrow by packing and organizing my work bag! Feelin’ great.

~ Day 18 ~~ Wednesday, December 31st, 2014 ~ Perform an 80/20 AnalysisLearn how to separate the majors and the minors. A lot of people don’t do well simply because they major in minor things.– Jim Rohn

Cheyenne-
Completed my anchor habit for 37 minutes. Meditated on the qualities I need to become – see Day 11 – for 5 minutes, then started my yoga. Decided to do a strength routine today, which included 3 sun salutations, the balancing poses (for Wednesday), boat post, some inversions, and twists. Boat pose is especially challenging for me. Most poses I tried to hold for 5 or 10 breaths, which added another layer of strength to the routine.

Warm-up and sun salutes each took 5 minutes, and the rest of the routine lasted 22 minutes. Did headstand instead of forearm stand and fell out of it the wrong way. Hurt my fingers. Made myself get back up and come down the right way before moving on. Was kinda scared I would hurt my fingers again. Did it anyway. Felt good.
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There’s a productivity principle borrowed from economics known as the Pareto Principle, which says that 80 percent of results come from about 20 percent of activities. Common examples:

✦ 80 percent of your business comes from the top 20 percent of your clients

✦ 80 percent of your fitness gains come from the most effort-filled 20 percent of your time in the gym or your running workouts

✦ 80 percent of the work you accomplish in a day comes from 20 percent of your work tasks

✦ You can clean 80 percent of your home in 20 percent of the time it takes you to do a full, detailed cleaning

The idea, then, is that you can drastically reduce the amount of stress in your life and time you spend on work, fitness, and just about anything else by focusing only on the 20 percent of activities that produce 80 percent of your results.

Today’s action: Use your 24-hour time inventory from a few days ago to figure out which 20 percent of your activities are responsible for 80 percent of your results in a given day as they pertain to your goals. For each of your one-year goals, identify the half dozen “majors,” and consider how you can increase the time and focus you spend on those activities, while eliminating, delegating, or at least reducing your time and energy expenditures on the “minors.”

80/20 Analysis

I feel like this is a little redundant for me. When I am focused I am usually focused, and when I’m not I’m not… And because of that I liked yesterdays exercise better: focus on what time you spend procrastinating and could cut out. I can do that. 80/20 is definitely true for my life, I probably do spend about 20 percent of my time getting 80 percent of my useful things done, but I spend ALL of that 20 percent on focused work. I just need to increase the percentage of my time spent on focused work… which is what yesterday was all about. I guess I can say generally that I am more productive at the beginning of the week, and after long spurs of unproductivity. I am more productive in the late morning and when I am home alone. There’s nothing I can really outsource… chores are really the only thing I do each day and we also can’t afford a housekeeper so I can’t cut that out. The other things like TV time and smoking can simply be eliminated, and I should have plenty of time with that alone. I don’t know if I’m thinking about it right but I just don’t get it. I’ll keep thinking on it though…

….

After feeling bad for a few days for not really doing the above journal, I ultimately decided to forgive myself for not doing it. It’s okay if every single topic in this book doesn’t resonate with me, and I am proud of myself for writing what I felt. Sometimes we just have to offer ourselves kindness and not force things that don’t feel productive or joyful.

~ Day 16 ~~ Monday, December 29th, 2014 ~Find Out Where is Your Time GoingThe essence of self-discipline is doing the important thing rather than the urgent thing.– Barry Werner

Cheyenne-
Completed my anchor habit for 50 minutes today. Did recipe for morning routine including sun salutations. 4 minutes mindfully making cards of yoga flow to put up on the wall. Sitting meditation for 6 minutes on the qualities of the person I need to become. 2 minutes offering up my practice, 2 minutes chanting Om, and 10 minutes doing daily warm-up. 26 minutes of yoga and daily relaxation. I did the whole sequence from Om Yoga today, and even did a recipe that included head stand, shoulder stand, and back bending poses in addition to the sun salutation sequence. Felt good to hold my headstand for 9 full breaths and my shoulder stand for 10. Also, it’s 11:30 am and I’ve journaled for the day! Hooray! I think this is the earliest in the day I’ve been all caught up on journals. Thank you solitude and winter break!

Tonight after failing to find the new DharmaCore location Remy and I meditated at home in my new meditation room! I meditated on the qualities I need to become, reciting “I am…” Ten times for each quality. I feel like I have been focusing on organization and responsibility a lot this this week
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Today’s action: Carry around a small notepad or piece of paper today, and record, to the minute, how you spend your time. When you’re done, group similar tasks and total up the time you spend on them.

I’ve been feeling a strong sense of joy and accomplishment this weekend. I got caught up on both my weekend tasks and am totally on track for the week! I also got a little over an hour of housework done, and read an entire short book: What Now? By Ann Patchett! Feeling super productive and proud of Remy for being so productive, responsible, self-disciplined, and mindful too! We’ve gotten to spend a lot of time together since getting back from visiting family, and I’m feeling super close!

Tonight before bed I spent thirty minutes cleaning up the study and readying my new meditation space for daily practice. Next I spent 35 minutes mindfully writing the qualities of the person I need to become on notecards and sticking them to the wall where I can see them. Then I meditated on the qualities for 15 minutes. I repeated each phrase “I am… ” ten times and pictured myself embodying that quality. Got tired at the end but finished anyway.

Did my new habit for the first time today: creativity brainstorming. On Day 12 I scheduled new habits and today was my first day to do creative exercises. I didn’t get to it until today, but I did about an hour of it today! See creativity journal for more.

Today’s action: It doesn’t matter what form your list takes; the solution is the same.

Kill your list.

Really. Trash it all. If you can’t bring yourself to do something so extreme, ruthlessly cross off items that don’t interest you anymore. In the case of reading, ask yourself: which would be more exciting, going to the store or the library to choose a new book, or reading one from your current backlog? If it’s starting a new one, you can guess what I’m going to tell you to do.

The best to-do list has one item on it. Three max. If something is important and lasting, you’ll remember it. It’ll make its way onto your list. Use today to look at your lists, and if you can’t throw them out completely, at least limit them drastically. Your creativity, curiosity, productivity, and enthusiasm about life will all thank you.

I can’t believe I trashed my to do list! It was really difficult for my type-A personality, and I’ll admit I didn’t trash it entirely… but I did slim it down to three items, and I feel great!

~ Day 14 ~~Saturday, December 27th, 2014 ~ Take Back Your TimeNo more yes. It’s either HELL YEAH, or no.– Derek Sivers

Cheyenne-
Caught up on all my Wake Up tasks for week (I didn’t do anything but journal since Monday). Completed my anchor habit for 35 minutes today. 8 minutes sitting meditation followed by 27 minutes of yoga. During meditation I reached a wonderful state of relaxation and mental clarity within the first 5 minutes. Even though I only got 7 hours of sleep last night I felt alert and well-rested. When, after a few minutes, my mind did go off on a tangent, it was about the birth I attended recently.

Within the past week was my first ever birth as a doula, and it was beautiful. Mom was a first-timer, and I was right there with her for every contraction. It was a wonderful birth and I left the parents very satisfied with me, and more importantly, their own efforts. But what drew me away from my meditation was one small thing that I had said during the birth; in response to her question, “They don’t really do episiotomies anymore do they? Wonder why not?” I said, “it’s better to tear than to be cut because it will heal better”. Seemed innocuous early on in labor but by the end, after an epidural caused her to have to push for 2+ hours, and she wasn’t getting the baby out she did end up getting and episiotomy. I wondered today if this might have in any way contributed to a negative birth experience for her. I thought about how I didn’t want to express judgments like this again, which reminded me that this is a learning process, and I thought, “I am already becoming a better doula.” Then I gently let go of these thoughts and went back to my meditation.

This is what meditating truly is – or so I am finally learning. Meditating is not about forgoing thought, the absence of thought, or the idea that thinking is “bad” and you are a “bad” meditator for thinking. Mindfulness is simply being aware of our thoughts. And when possible, not simply getting caught up in the endless flow of thoughts. We are so caught up in our day-to-day that we are almost always riding our thoughts from one to the next, without ever stepping back and looking at the wave of thoughts we’re riding. Are we acting or reacting? Are we thinking mostly of the future, present, or past? Are we irritable? Impatient? Happy? Relaxed? Stressed? When we don’t take the time to sit and be with our thoughts then we can become a slave to both our thoughts and the emotions they incite. Many of my friends are slaves to their everyday thoughts. I too am a slave to my strong emotions, and when one of these strong feelings – such as anger – comes over me I am often unable to resist the urge to convey a spiteful tone or say something disrespectful. Meditating is like practice for releasing your emotions in more effective ways. Sitting and releasing your need to follow your thoughts where they lead you can increase your ability to act and react mindfully in challenging situations. How can we ever hope to calm ourselves down when we are enraged if we can’t even resist the urge to get up and write down a thought we have while we’re meditating? Practice letting go is practice for life.

Once I found a deep state of relaxation again for a couple minutes I gently brought my awareness outward and started to do my yoga very mindfully. It was a wonderful. Long, slow routine today. Did Inversions from Om Yoga. Held my headstand for 10 full breathes.

Today’s action: Take out a piece of paper and, down the left side, list out every existing time commitment you can think of that you’ve made to other people. This list should include:

Once you’ve got what you think is a complete list, make another column on the right side of the page. This is your “keep” list. One by one, go down your list of commitments and decide if this commitment really deserves to take up your precious time, and if it fits in with the image of the person you’re committed to becoming. If it does — and some certainly will — write it down in the “keep” list. But for each commitment that doesn’t belong in your life, axe it.
-Matt Frazier

I attended my first birth for doula certification last week! It was an amazing experience. I wrote a birth essay to encapsulate the experience. Here is my essay for certification, with names removed.

Birth Essay – Baby Levi

Mama called at 10:30am. She was admitted to the hospital after a scheduled visit that morning showed a low fetal heart rate. The physician warned mama of the possibility of a cesarean section – but wanted to monitor and see if this could be avoided. We spoke again at 12:00pm and she happily told me the baby’s heart rate had stabilized and they were planning an amniotomy at 1:30pm. She said she would call me when labor began, and at 4:00pm I was invited to join them. I arrived by 4:45pm and assisted with her ever-intensifying contractions. We tried a variety of position changes and coping techniques during this time. Mama’s birth plan included her openness to an epidural, and at around 7:00pm she asked for one. She was tired and wasn’t keeping fluids down so they introduced IV fluids. Afterward she did not feel her contractions at all, but her nausea continued. She expressed tremendous gratitude for my aromatherapy techniques. At 10:20pm her cervix was checked and she was told to push, although she wasn’t feeling the urge. Beginning at 10:42pm she pushed for 2 hours (the nurse timing her contractions) before deciding to labor down while the epidural wore off. By 1:15am the urge to push was strong, and she began pushing again. After 30 minutes of pushing, her baby was born at 1:42am. Mama and baby experienced skin-to-skin contact immediately and were nursing within 45 minutes.

My role at this birth was to provide a calm, collected presence and offer suggestions for the father. Early in labor they had some questions and appreciated having me present for distracting conversation. When Mama experienced nausea and vomiting, dad and I took turns swapping and cleaning out vomit trays for her. I suggested essential oils on a damp washcloth and showed dad to hold it near her face during bouts of nausea, which really helped. I also suggested a variety of position changes; those she found most helpful were the birth ball, swaying, sitting, and semi-prone. Mama was not set on avoiding pain medications, and my role was to provide information and nonjudgmental support for her decisions. When she asked for an epidural I encouraged her to take some time to think about it and make sure it was her decision. I reminded her of other coping strategies we could try, and when she wasn’t interested I reminded her that she had the right to make this decision for her birth.

When Mama was admitted earlier that day she was nervous for the baby’s health and a c-section. We spoke briefly about this over the phone and she said that she accepted if this needed to happen, but she hoped it could be avoided. She was extremely grateful to hear that she could proceed with a vaginal birth and seemed to take this as a good sign. When I arrived she was talkative and chatty between contractions, but liked to go inward during contractions. She seemed to be coping well for a few hours, then as her contractions intensified she asked, “is this contraction going to end?” and I reminded her to focus on her breathing. Breathing and counting really worked for her as a ritual, but in-between contractions she had difficulty relaxing. Dad and I took turns massaging her shoulders and helping her release the tension. Once she got the epidural she was surprised by how good she felt. She said repeatedly how glad she was for the opportunity to rest and seemed satisfied with her decision. She was pleased that she “only needed the epidural and nothing else”. During pushing she said, “I thought this was going to be the easy part!” but she pushed like a champ anyway and kept her spirits up for many hours until she had her beautiful baby. Immediately after the birth she experienced shaking and chills for an hour. She said, “thought it would be over once he was out” and that she felt guilty that she wasn’t “enjoying him yet”. I reassured her that this was normal, that she didn’t need to feel guilty, and talking about it seemed to help. Within an hour she was visibly happy and enjoying her nursing baby. Afterwards Mama said she was especially grateful that I was there to help her relax and focus on her baby during this time immediately post-birth. Overall she seems tremendously proud and satisfied with her experience.

The main thing I learned during this birth was the power of flexibility to enhance the birth experience. Mama went into her birth well-educated, with a vague outline of what she wanted, and a lot of flexibility and openness to the experience. Her openness to pain medication and interventions helped her feel successful and powerful in her decisions regarding her birth. She didn’t view it as a failure when she ultimately felt she needed an epidural. I learned that being an effective doula isn’t about avoiding medications and interventions, but providing nonjudgmental support for someone to experience a great birth the way they define it.

~ Day 13 ~~Friday, December 26th, 2014 ~ Weekly Planning and ReviewGive me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.– Abraham Lincoln

Cheyenne-
Completed my anchor habit for 27 minutes today. 6 minutes meditation followed by 21 minutes of yoga. Started with sitting meditation on my new gift from Remy! He got me a zafu and zabuton for Christmas! They are too beautiful, I feel spoiled. Then did daily warmup, followed by Back Bend poses from Om Yoga. Chanted Om before and after. Felt solid.

Today’s action: Schedule your weekly planning and review session by setting up reminders and choosing a trigger activity that you do each week close to the time you’d like to do the session. If that session is scheduled for today, go for it!

1. Goal [write down your main goal statement with deadline here — it’s good to constantly remind yourself of what you’re aiming for]
2. Victories from last week
3. What went wrong last week
4. What you learned last week — meaning what you’ll do differently to correct the failures, and any other insights you had, memorable quotes you came across, etc.
5. What you’re committed to accomplishing in the next week (three items seems to be a good number, but it could be more or less depending on a lot of factors)
– Matt Frazier, No Meat Athlete

Weekly Planning & Review

Goal: Get finances under control and start saving*

Victories: This week I paid my final payment on my Dominican loan. I spent some time (20 minutes) updating the budget. I demonstrated that I am hard-working and responsible.

Room for Improvement: I did not do my stated goals which were to pay bills and make a credit card payment. I also didn’t research business/nonprofit models. I could have demonstrated more organization and determination.

What I’ve Learned: I didn’t pay bills that are due or credit cards because I wanted to get the budget updated first, which is often something I will put off paying bills and credit cards to do. That is something that can get in my way. I asked Remy for his help in updating the budget. He agreed to input his spending into the budget once a week.

Next Week Commitments:Pay due bills and make a credit card payment.
Start using our accounts correctly: get direct deposit updated and $250 from each paycheck should go in spending, this will limit our spending better.
Get The Passion Planner

Room for Improvement: Skipped meditation on Wednesday and Thursday (Christmas eve and day) and excused it because it was the holidays. I could have been more determined and disciplined.

What I’ve Learned: The times that I need to practice meditation the most are also the times I’m most likely to skip them. I skipped meditation Wednesday and Thursday because I was busy and traveling and stressed, but I think if I had made time to sit anyway I would have had a better time.

Next Week Commitments:I will meditate every day
I will act mindfully or patiently in at least 3 situations that are challenging for me.

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Goal: Get DONA Certification

Victories: I have much to be grateful for this week. This week I attended not only my first ever birth, but I collected all the paperwork and surveys from mom, nurse, and doctor! I was there for a little over 10 hours and I feel extremely grateful the parents for letting me take part in their birth. Even though I felt more than a little unsure at times, I managed to get all good evaluations on my surveys! I left the family breastfeeding with their newborn and all of us satisfied with the experience.

Room for Improvement: I did not read my DONA packet carefully before printing 3 surveys for moms, and no surveys for doctors or nurses. Turns out I’ll need three for each birth instead of three total. I wasn’t even sure I’d be able to count this birth, but everything worked out perfectly in the end.

What I’ve Learned: I need to be very careful about how I set up labor intensive parents expectations. I’m already learning how they may rely on me as a source of information even if I don’t report myself to be an expert. Luckily mom was very flexible and did not seem to mind any unexpected procedures that occurred during her birth, but otherwise my comment about her pushing, and my comment about episiotomies could have made her feel negatively about her birth experience.

Next Week Commitments:Reread my DONA packet more carefully.
Write Birth Essay
Print more surveys when you go back to work.
Finish the entire book The Birth Partner.

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Goal: Arrange personal sperm donors

Victories: I invited donor to dinner on Friday, January 2nd, 2015.

Room for Improvement: My friend and donor had a rough holiday, and wanted to hang out on Friday. I told him I was going shopping and he came to the same mall! I didn’t really spend that much time with him because I felt rushed by the birth I’d be attending later. I rushed off to buy groceries without saying goodbye. I really need to make sure I’m cultivating my friendships and not ever blowing the people that I love off.

What I’ve Learned: This may be a lengthy process, so I definitely want to start with a solid foundation.

Next Week Commitments:Take donor out to dinner!

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Goal: Read 12 books

Victories: I read a few pages of The Birth Partner during the birth I attended. I demonstrated patience and strength.

Room for Improvement: I could have made more time to read. I could have demonstrated more responsibility and self-discipline.

~ Day 12 ~~ Thursday, December 25th, 2014 ~ Choose and Schedule Habits that Help You

Sow a thought, and you reap an act; Sow an act, and you reap a habit; Sow a habit, and you reap character; Sow a characters and you reap a destiny.– Samuel Smiles

Cheyenne-
Happy Christmas Day! Completed my anchor habit for 10 minutes today. I’m easing myself back into my commitments firmly but gently. I didn’t do Om Yoga today, and I didn’t meditate, but I did do a flow I made up with my partner who was having a headache, we did some downward dogs, some vinyasas through chaturanga to upward dog, some triangle poses, and ended with a headstand for as long as we could hold it. We also tried some partner poses.

You remember flying like superman on your dads legs when you were a kid?

Yeah. Same thing. It was very playful and fun – not at all about technique or working up a heavy sweat. It was a great way to spend time together… We were laughing, helping each other, and having a great time! We needed that after the drive from my family’s house. I love my family to death, and this was one of the best Christmas’s in my memory, but traveling and staying with family is always stressful and sleeping in another bed is never as restful. When you travel on your vacation, it can definitely feel like you need a vacation after your vacation!

Today’s action: Decide on the most important new habits that will help you become the person you need to be to achieve your goals. Then put their start dates onto your calendar, or another place where you’ll be reminded of them and have a few days’ notice when it’s time to start a new one.

Completed my anchor habit today for about 5 minutes (didn’t time it today). I did standing poses from Om Yoga. Chanted a little bit before and meditated in savasana for a couple minutes. Didn’t have a lot of time before work but it felt good to get it done.

I have added meditation to my anchor habit, and it has felt great to meditate daily. Today I meditated after yoga, and I also meditated for at least 5 minutes while driving, I’ve only been doing it for a couple days but I already feel the benefit. I like the idea of equanimity meditation, the metaphor of a still pond in the face of the wind. I would like to go into this holiday with family free of expectation, because the holidays can be such a time of pressure and expectation.

Today’s action:

For each of your one-year goals, write a paragraph about why you are so committed to making it happen (in the case of the one-year goals that are stepping stones to longer-term goals, you can combine the short- and long-term goal since the why’s will be similar). Make sure you describe the following three things, with as much emotion as possible:

2. What will happen if you don’t follow through (make this one painful, and really let yourself feel that pain)

3. Why you know you absolutely can make it happen — and get excited about that!

Alternatively, create a huge list of your reasons for each goal. I personally find that writing paragraphs stirs up more emotion than a list — and that’s the purpose here — but choose the approach that works best for you (or do both).

Why’s

Get finances under control and start saving – open a space – buy a house

I am a late bloomer to the realization that finances are the foundation to everything. I have spent most of my young adult life rejecting the narrative of saving and frugality imparted to me by my dad growing up. I seem to have forgotten many of the lessons he painstakingly taught me during my adolescence about not a accruing credit card debt, managing my money, and being thrifty. Somehow since moving back from Chicago Remy and I have never paid off our credit cards. This makes me feel shame even though I don’t believe money is all important. I have wavered almost constantly in my relationship to money: wanting more, not wanting to get stressed about it, getting stressed about it anyway… And while I was agonizing over these things I forgot that it does take careful financial planning to make your dreams come true. I need to improve my credit score to be able to apply for loans, and I’ll need loans to start my space. I’ll need a loan to buy a house someday. I realized through making and prioritizing my short and long term goals that my life calling will not bring me fame and fortune, my calling is to serve community and make enough money to live comfortably. I don’t see myself ever making more than $40-50,000 per year at most. So I will always need to be mindful about my finances, so that I can be responsible with my income and not fret about money all the time.

If I don’t follow through with getting my finances taken care of – which means paying off credit cards and making regular payments on our student loans – and start saving, I’ll never raise the money to go to yoga teacher training, to meditation training, get my DONA certification, or put down a down payment on a house. I’ll become even more financially stressed if I have a baby and my finances aren’t under control. I absolutely know that I can do this becaus Leos are determined, confident, and ambitious. If I believe in myself and hold myself accountable I can achieve anything, in high school I got amazing grades, was super involved, and excelled at everything it felt like, it would feel great to feel that way again. All I need to do is exercise a little restraint in the short term and I’ll get what I want in the long term: a space, a baby, a house, time to travel, and lots of joy in life, I already have so much joy, and I can’t wait to cultivate more!

Yoga Certification – open a spaceMeditation certification – open a space

I love yoga. My daily practice is important to me . I could never list the benefits of a lifelong yoga and meditation practice. I want everyone to become aquainted with yoga in their life, and I hope that many choose to make practice a part of their lives in one form or another. I want to contribute to a more intentional, mindful, spiritual, and active world. Being active was something I loved about working at MPIRG, and it helped me realize that I want to be active in my career. I want to help people believe that everyone can do yoga. I want to help people. I would love to just start teaching yoga right now, but I wouldn’t be any good. I need to complete yoga teacher training so that I can truly serve my students, not to mention so I can depend my practice. Yoga certification and meditation certification

Get DONA Doula Certification – open a space

I am determined to complete my certification because of the experience I will gain and the help it will be for my doula business. I want to become more than a trained doula, I want to be a well-informed, and experienced doula with education to back up my career. I like to learn, and the parents that I work with deserve for me to be knowledgable. The first of many steps in my journey to be a doula is to understand the technical and literal aspects of pregnancy and birth. I am excited to take a childbirth education class and a breastfeeding class, and I’m excited to write my birth essays. There is a lot of knowledge I can get from the books I will need to read, and the experience of three births will give me some foundation of understanding for birth itself. The DONA certification will give me additional credentials for my doula business

Arrange personal sperm donors – have a baby

Why do I want to have a baby? That’s an impossible question. I want to have a baby because the sky is blue, because there are rainbows, and because I think my puppies would love them. I want to have a baby because they are beautiful, I love human beings and believe in their innate capacity for goodness. I want to have a baby because I think I could be a good mom if I work really hard. I want to have a baby because I think I can be an even better parent than my parents were. I want to have a baby because I think more people like me should have babies in the world. Before I come off sounding arrogant, I don’t mean to say and it is me who is special, I guess I mean my values. I want my child to be their own person, but I also want to show them how wonderful veganism can be, how great being queer is, how freeing gender can be and how constraining sometimes, I want to be honest with them about how the world really is, and I want to teach them yoga, art, music, sports, and theater. I also want to go through the experience of birth at least once. There are many reasons to have a baby, and if I don’t or can’t have one, I can try to adopt or foster. I can also do LGBT host home either way someday hopefully. I know if I put my mind to it I can probably have a baby.

Read 12 books – read all the books we own

Why am I absolutely determined to read all the books we own? Because I’ve helped shlep them all over hell in all our moved, and I’ll be damned if I kept them around to not read them! I moved these books from University Ave, to 8th St SE, to a storage unit, to 37th Ave S, to Chicago, and most recently to 16th Ave S. They were heavy, if I don’t get to read them I’ll be pissed, so I better just read them. If I read 12 per year I’ll read 120 books in 10 years, which should get me pretty close! Woo! Let’s do it!

~ Day 9 ~
~ Monday, December 22nd, 2014 ~Make the PlansIn preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is everything.
– Dwight D. Eisenhower

Cheyenne-
Completed my anchor habit today for ~15 minutes. I did sun salutations from Om Yoga. Actually did the whole process – sit first, chant, daily warm-up, then sequence, then savasana, sit, chant, and offer up my practice, it felt good to do the whole routine!

Today’s action:
Create plans for the achievement of your goals. Be as detailed as possible without making this an overwhelming task that causes you to procrastinate. Set both long-term and short term benchmarks, getting more specific in your plans as the time frame shortens.
Since each of your long-term goals has an associated one-year goal with it, you can combine each pair into one plan, which increases in detail as the time frame shortens. For any additional one-year goals you set, create separate plans for each.

January:
Read a book (DONA)
X Attend birth 1
Meet with Matt and any other potential sperm donors
By end of the month: finish your research on business/nonprofit model, decide which one for “the space”
Take childbirth education or breastfeeding class

Year 1 (2015):Get finances under control and start saving*
Participate in a 3 or 10 day meditation retreat
Get DONA Certification
Read 12 books
Have $2400 saved for YTT
Evaluate conception efforts at 1 year

End of June 2016 (1.5 Years):
Have $3600 saved for YTT
Read 18 books

Year 2 (2016):
Have $4800 saved for YTT by end of December
Read 24 books

End of June 2017 (2.5 Years):
Have $6000 saved for YTT by end of June
Yoga teacher training